


Getting in Deep

by hilandmum



Category: Stumptown (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:35:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27922363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hilandmum/pseuds/hilandmum
Summary: Dex goes after drug traffickers without telling Miles.
Relationships: Grey McConnell & Dex Parios, Miles Hoffman & Dex Parios
Comments: 4
Kudos: 2
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Getting in Deep

**Author's Note:**

  * For [meridian_rose (meridianrose)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meridianrose/gifts).



> I hope this is to your liking, meridianrose, and fulfills your prompt.

Getting in Deep

Dex sat in her car, trying to decide whether she should tell Miles what she’d learned, but decided not to bother him, not until she confirmed the intel. Maybe she should just give the info to Grey, but then he might go off and do something stupid. She knew from personal experience that never led to a good ending. 

“Whatcha doin’ there?” Her brother knocked on her car window.

“It’s okay, Ansel. I’m resting.”

“Resting and thinking?” Ansel smiled. “I do that sometimes. If I just sit still, all the sounds around me go quiet and I can think.”

“Exactly what I’m doing.” She looked at his empty hands. “What are you doing out here? Doesn’t Grey need you inside?”

“I’m on a break.”

“A break, huh?” She smiled. “Well, since you’re on a break, how about helping me with something?”

“What do I gotta do?”

“Bring me a beer and ask Grey to come out here.”

“Sure. That’s easy.” Ansel grinned and went back into the bar. When Grey came out, Ansel was with him.

Dex realized she should have told her brother to stay inside, but it couldn’t be helped. 

“What’ve you got for me?” Grey asked.

“Gardiner’s shipment will come in tomorrow. Six A.M.” She glanced at Ansel. “Keep my brother with you until this is over.”

Ansel frowned. “I wanna go with you, Dex.”

“You can’t, Buddy. Make sure Grey’s safe, okay? You’re the only one who can do that.”

“So you’re worried about both of us?” the bar owner said. “And who’s going to worry about you?”

“I can take care of myself.”

Grey frowned. “I’d be happier if you weren’t alone.”

“If anyone’s with me, it’ll tip ‘em off.”

“At least let Miles know where you’re going.”

“Then I’d have to tell him why. No, he has enough to worry about. Best if I go alone.” She pressed her lips together. “I’ll come back here when it’s over.”

“Promise?”

She hesitated then nodded. “Promise.”

Dex knew the men who worked with Gardiner liked to hang out at a pool hall not far from the Bad Alibi. It was close to quitting time and they’d be heading there soon. She started the car and drove over. 

When she entered the establishment, they were already there. Two men approached her. “Come to watch?”

“For a little while. But then I’ll be ready to play.”

He laughed. “We got us a filly who wants to play,” he told his buddies.

“Oh, yeah? What’s yer name, pretty lady?”

“I go by…” She didn’t want to give her real name. “Deb. I’m Deb.” Close enough. She held out a hand and a couple of the men shook it. 

“We usually play for money, but since you’re new, you don’t have to,” said a slim man of medium height with thinning brown hair. The others seemed to defer to him. “I’m Larry.”

“Hi, Larry. I don’t mind playing for money.”

***

She tossed and turned all night, despite being fifty dollars richer. Morning couldn’t come soon enough. Still, when her alarm played it’s mournful tune at 5 A.M., she practically jumped out of bed. A quick shower woke her fully. She dressed in dark clothes. Breakfast would have to wait. She couldn’t keep food down anyway. 

Dex drove out to the warehouse. She found the other guys waiting for their boss to show and, more important, for the merchandise to arrive. 

Talking to Larry, she spotted Grey skulking around the corner. She groaned but covered it by asking, “How much longer do we have to wait around?”

“Relax. It’ll be here soon. Meanwhile,” he looked at each of the men, “I’ll need to post a guard outside.”

“I’ll do it,” she said. 

“Okay, but I need two people. Nick, go with her.”

“Sure boss.” Nick was probably in his thirties, muscular and tall. A good man to have with you in a fight, but she had to find a way to talk to Grey without him seeing. 

She smiled. “Don’t know who the boss thinks might be hanging around here so early in the morning, but you and I can handle anything, can’t we?”

“We always need someone to guard the exits, just to be sure.”

She nodded, an idea forming. “Are there more exits besides this one?”

“Yeah, around there.” He pointed to the right side wall of the building. 

“Maybe one of us should check it out.”

“I’ll go.” He was off before she could argue, not that she planned to. 

Once he was out of sight and sound, she said in a loud whisper, “Grey, didn’t I say you should stay at the bar? What are you doing here?”

Grey smiled. “I thought you needed back-up and I was right.”

“No. I have it handled,” she insisted.

“Is this where the delivery will be made?”

“Yes, now go away, and leave me to it.” She didn’t have to tell him that, although she wasn’t so hot at relationships, she knew how to trap criminals of all types.

He didn’t go far, only to his car out on the road, but it would be enough to keep him safe. Meanwhile, she watched and waited. 

The delivery didn’t arrive for another hour. By then she’d changed her thoughts about her tactics five times, always coming back to what worked for her in the past. She’d wait until the drugs were loaded onto a smaller truck, then take out the driver and the leader of this crew, probably Larry. The rest would probably toss their guns and high-tail it out of the area.

Loading the panel truck took longer than she expected. By the time they were done, it was close to nine. The sun hid behind looming dark clouds. The scent of a coming storm was accompanied by a fierce wind.

They closed the back doors of the truck with two men inside. The rest of the gang went back into the warehouse. An interior light came on when the driver got in. Larry took the shot-gun seat. The light gave Dex a clear enough vision of where the two men sat. She raised her gun and fired. The bullet glanced off the side windows.

“Damn, bullet-proof glass,” she muttered to herself. What she wouldn’t give for something that would pierce it. Failing that, she shot at the tires. One blew, and the driver stopped the truck, got out and gave her a clear shot at him. 

That was all Larry needed to encourage him to get out too, but he crouched around the front of the truck and took a shot in her direction.

She waited until he rose again to take a second shot and then took him out. 

Sirens filled the air. So fast? Here she thought she was home free, and the cops had to butt their heads in. Sure, her intention had been to call Miles in an hour or so. How did they even know about this? The only ones who knew her involvement were Ansel and Grey. If she disappeared, she might not have to deal with the police just yet. Eventually, they’d trace the bullets in the driver and Larry to her gun, the one registered to her. She had to disappear immediately.

She back away from her position and straight into Grey. “How many times do you have to be told to go?”

“What’re you gonna do?” he asked.

“Disappear for a while.”

“Dex, they’ll find you eventually.” He frowned. “Listen, you shot the bad guys and kept them from getting away. Maybe they’ll give you a medal.”

“I should have told Miles what I planned.”

“So, why didn’t you?”

She shook her head. “I gotta get outta here.”

“Head for the Rez. Sue Lynn will hide you.”

She smiled. “Good idea.”

“Yeah, sometimes I have one.”

She made a decision quickly. “Watch over Ansel while I’m gone.” She rushed to her car and drove off. Hiding out for a couple of days was a good idea. By then, the cops could take control of the drugs and go through the motions of finding out who killed the dealer and the driver.

When she reached the sign for the reservation without a tail, she sighed with relief. There was still the hurdle of Naomi, but since Dex was currently in Sue Lynn’s good graces, she expected she could stay. 

Sue Lynn came out as Dex drove up to her home. “Haven’t seen you in a while. Woulda been better not to see you now.”

“Why, what’s happening now?”

“There’s another fight for leadership.” She shook her head. “Not sure I have the support to win this time. If Naomi sees I’m going out of my way to help you, I’ll lose her vote too.”

“Then maybe I can help you.” I didn’t know how, but then I didn’t have all the facts of the situation. “Who’s challenging you?”

“Who do you think?” She grunted.

Sue Lynn had faced a challenge before, but the elders of the tribe were greedy and she’d done a good job bringing in money for them and the tribe. 

“So, what do I do? Where do I go?”

She tsk-tsked. “You must have gotten yourself into quite a mess this time.” 

“Guess I’ll have to handle it myself.” Dex turned to go then turned back. “Good luck.”

“Same to you.”

Dex got back in the car and drove off with no destination in mind. So, she was surprised when she found herself in front of the precinct office. She looked up at the building and then drove into a visitor’s parking spot. As she got out, she muttered, “Might as well bite the bullet.”

She entered the police station and asked for Miles. 

“Sorry, Ms. Parios.” The sergeant really looked sorry. “He’s out on a case.”

“When do you expect him back?”

The beefy man shrugged. “Don’t know. He’s been gone most of the day.”

“Then I’ll wait.” She took a seat on one of the hard wood benches and watched people come and go. Two of the men looked vaguely familiar, cops from Miles shop. Were they planted in the gang? More important, did they recognize her?

It was a longer wait than she expected, and she was starting to doze off when Miles was suddenly there before her. 

“Well, well, well.” He didn’t look happy to see her. “What do we have here?”

She shook her head to clear it. “I was waiting for you.”

“So the sergeant told me.”

“You’ve been out on a case,” she said, fishing for information.

But he must have heard something in her voice and narrowed his eyes. “What do you know about it?”

She shrugged. “Only what the sergeant told me. 

“And you were no where near the warehouse on Carlton this afternoon?” 

“There are lots of warehouses down there.”

He smiled. “Okay. I’ll take your word for it now. What did you want to talk to me about?”

“Actually, you know what? Nothing.” She started to leave.

“You didn’t come here and wait an hour to tell me nothing.”

She looked at the floor, reorganizing her thoughts. What could she say without admitting she’d killed two men earlier? “What made you think I was at the warehouse?”

He smirked. “A little bird told me.”

She glared at him.

“Okay. The driver wasn’t dead when I got to him,” Miles said, “but the only thing he said before he died was your name.”

Thud. Her heart drop to her knees, and they couldn’t hold it up.

“Dex, you okay?”

“I will be. It’s been a difficult day. I’d better get out of your hair. You have lots to do.” She forced herself to walk toward the door. 

“Not so fast.” He grabbed her arm. 

She didn’t have the energy to resist, and anyway, it would be useless. “I thought we were done.”

“Oh, we’re far from done. Spill. From the top.”

She rubbed the back of her neck, running through the possibilities in her head. She’d gotten others out of tighter situations before. Why couldn’t she come up with the right words to convince Miles she was innocent— when she wasn’t?

He took her silence as a kind of confession, to what she’d have to wait to find out. “I can make you talk.” He chuckled. “But then I’d have to decide whether what you say is the truth or a lie.”

“It was a mistake to come here.”

“So then why did you?”

She shook my head. “Don’t remember. I’ve been sitting here, thinking, and I’ve decided you’re not the person I wanted to see.”

He stared at me. “Who is?”

She had to come up with a name, someone Miles would accept. “Someone in Internal Affairs.”

He seemed to mull that over. “I’ll see if I can get you in to to see someone.”

She flashed a smile. “Thanks.”

He wagged a finger. “But if I find you’re lying to me, if this is connected to my case…” He sighed. “I’ll come up with something.”

“I’ll wait here.” She sat on the bench again and thought about what she’d tell anyone from Internal Affairs that didn’t have anything to do with Miles case or , if so, only tangentially

Forty-five minutes went by, and she started to think she could just slip out. Maybe Miles hadn’t found someone to talk to her, maybe he got called out to another case. She stood and was halfway to the door when he reappeared with a middle-aged man, shorter him with a balding head and horn-rimmed glasses. She wondered if they still made those, anything so she wouldn’t have to think about what to tell the man. 

Miles introduced them. The man was Frank Carson, an agent in Internal Affairs.

Dex smiled at him and thought more about what to say. She settled for the information that started her on the journey a few days ago and the information she’d gotten one ago, long before she killed anyone. Two someones. 

She glanced at Miles, who remained with them, and said, “Mr. Carson, in the course of an investigation, I came across the information that a load of drugs was being delivered to a warehouse here in town with plans to send them to a distribution center north of the city.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Miles glared at her.

“On my way to tell Detective Hoffman about it, I heard on a police scanner that a truck with a similar cargo was found with the driver and another man shot. I sat here all evening waiting for Detective Hoffman to return, but by then, my information about it was stale.” Dex crossed my arms. 

“What do you want IA to do about it?” Carson asked.

“My information said two of the men involved were cops.” 

“Know anything about that, Hoffman?” Carson asked.

Miles stared at Dex then told Carson, “I had one man embedded in the gang. That’s why we got to the scene before the truck left. According to Murph, the shooter was a woman.”

“And the other cop?”

Miles sighed, appearing reluctant to tell Carson, “Murphy brought his partner with him. Thought there’d be some trouble.”

Carson nodded thoughtfully. “Well, thank you, Miss Parios. Seems we didn’t need your intel on this one.”

“Seems that way, sir.” She smiled.

“I’ll see you out.” Miles steered her toward the door. “Next time, I want to know if you have a lead when you get it.”

She mock-saluted. “Aye, aye, sir.”

He grimaced. “I’m too busy now to deal with your smart-ass mouth. But next time you have a tip-off like that, you call and let me know, hear?”

Dex had gotten the message the first time. She nodded and escaped out the door. She should have known the kind of reception she’d get from Miles, but she had to give them the information she had, info they’d never get themselves. Now it was in the laps of the cops and she could walk away.

Rather than go home, she headed for the Bad Alibi. She needed to see friendly faces for a while before she turned in for the night. The first one she saw was Grey’s and it wasn’t as friendly as she hoped.

“You shouldn’t have left me like that, you know. Didn’t you go to the Rez? And why are you back here?”

“Were you worried about me?” She smirked. 

“What if I was? Dex, you can’t keep doing things that put you in the line of fire.”

“Why not?” She shrugged. “You should know by now, I’ve been there and I can take it.”

“That why you headed to the Rez?”

“That was your idea.”

“One that you readily took.” He shook his head. “What happened? Where’d you actually go?”

“You wouldn’t have asked where I went if you didn’t already know somehow that Sue Lynn turned me away.”

“And that was hours ago.”

“Technically, it was only an hour and a half. Had to talk to IA.”

“And Hoffman?” His nostrils flared.

“He was there.”

Grey glared at her. “They still don’t know you did it.”

She leaned closer. “Keep it down. You’re the only one who knows.” She told him the story she spun for Miles and the IA guy.

Gray whistled when she stopped. “That’s some tall tale.”

“What else could I tell them?” Her nose wrinkled, and her voice rose. “That I was there? Miles knows that. That I pulled the trigger?” 

He looked around, grateful no one was close. “Now, who should keep it down?”

Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I came here because I don’t know what else I should do.”

“Best thing is to lay low.” He motioned up and down with his palm aimed at the floor. “As I learned from my own dealings with the law. Let ‘em come to you. Or not. Don’t volunteer any more information.”

She nodded. 

“Get your mind off it. Have a meal. When was the last time you ate?”

“Now you’re starting to sound like a mother hen.” She smiled.

“You could use one.” He went off to order her a burger and fries, and returned with a bottle of beer. Handing it to her, he said, “Is there anything you’re not telling me about Gardiner’s crew?”

She shook her head and sipped her beer in silence.

He left again to talk to a couple who just sat in a booth. 

Ansel brought out Dex’s meal when it was ready. “Hi, where’d you go?”

“I went to a few places, Buddy.” She stared at her bottle. “Saw Sue Lynn and Miles and a few other folks.”

“Did you say hi from me?”

She smiled. “They were busy.”

“Oh.” With a shrug, he went back to the kitchen.

She was almost finished eating when Miles showed up. Even though she’d known he was bound to come, her last bite threatened to return to her mouth. 

He sat next to her at the bar. “There were several things you left out when you came by earlier.”

“What kind of things?” She sipped her beer and looked at the bottles lined up behind the bar, rather than face him.

“Why you were there and why you shot the two men, for starters.” He didn’t have to say where ‘there’ was. The annoyed look on his face made it hard for me to look at him. 

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly while she considered what he’d do depending on what she said. But she’d run out of ideas. “Like I told your friend from Internal Affairs, I got a tip about what was going down today.” She looked at the ground and swallowed the lump threatening to stop me from breathing. “I know I should have told you then.” She held up a hand to ward off whatever response he had. “Instead, I went to the bar where Gardiner and his gang played pool, got to know them, convinced them to let me in on the job. I guess you can figure out the rest.”

“When will you ever learn? You’re not a one-man…”

“…woman, that’s one-woman.”

“I stand corrected. One-woman vigilante machine.”

“Are they dead? Larry and the driver?”

“Yes.”

She gulped. “Am I under arrest?”

“Dex, if you’d come to me yesterday with your intel,” he replied, “or if you’d come to me right after the event, I could spin my report to turn you into a hero. But as things stand, at this late date, no can do.”

She closed her eyes, wishing for a do-over. Was the sense of satisfaction from killing those two men worth it?

“Law enforcement is here for a reason,” he continued. “You have to respect that. Even if you were a cop, behavior like this would be unacceptable, but you’re a PI.” He rubbed his forehead. “I should throw you to the wolves within the department.”

She pressed her lips together and rocked back and forth on her heels. 

His phone chirped and he walked away to answer it.

She finally opened her eyes, watched him and waited. 

Miles returned. “The higher ups decided not to charge you. Both the driver and Larry Deacon were wanted men, and shooting them to prevent them from distributing street drugs is being heralded as cooperation of a citizen with the police force.” He stood from his stool and, without another word, left the bar. 

She watched him go, wondering if she’d just lost a friend.


End file.
